


What makes a man relapse?

by bluecarrot



Category: 18th Century CE RPF, Hamilton - Miranda
Genre: F/M, M/M, Multi, Post-Reynolds Pamphlet
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2017-01-03
Updated: 2017-01-03
Packaged: 2018-09-12 18:27:09
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 2
Words: 2,982
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/9084283
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/bluecarrot/pseuds/bluecarrot
Summary: in which Burr reads the Reynolds Pamphlet and has some feeeeeeeelings, which turn into actions, which turn into reactions, which turn back into feelings, which in turn become words.





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> written 12/27/2016.
> 
> *
> 
> "What makes a man relapse  
> When he's about to lose it all?"  
> (david bazan)

Burr buys the Reynolds Pamphlet from a street vendor and sits down on a park bench and reads it -- skims really, because it is quite long and he keeps breaking into untoward laughter. Then he tucks it in his coat and goes home and reads it again, more thoroughly, hearing it in Hamilton's voice. He writes as he speaks, slapdash and ill-considered, contradicting himself every few sentences as if he can’t remember the sense of his topic from one moment to the next. Arrogant and foolish and inexpressibly dear.

He drinks a third cup of tea (black, a thin slice of precious lemon floating on the surface) and lingers. "I brought her onward, to my personal chambers," Hamilton wrote, and Burr can see it: the blind-darkened rooms, the opulent wood paneling, the green carpets. "There she stood, and prescribed such a tale, of woe, and misbegotten fate, that my heart was captured; I promised, therefore, to assist her, in whatsoever method lay within my power, and to protect her from the ill-will of her husband."

 _Quid pro quo_ , Alexander?

"She was forthcoming with her gratitude, and more so, with her expressions of physical thanks. Soon enough, I found myself to be compromised, most uncomfortably."

I'll bet, thinks Burr, feeling _uncomfortable_ himself. He shifts on his chair.

"Her profusions, and moreover the pity in my heart, for such an object, in such a state, come on me bereft of help, moved me greatly; I confess it was too much for me; I soon brought her close and felt, as if in a dream, the sweet pressure of her mouth on mine, a pleasure all the more exquisite for being a sin, as well I knew it was, being ever cognizant of that truth even in my worst extremities of desire. She either had not been told, or disregarded, the stain to our purity; she exhibited no restraint in bringing me open to her, as she fell to her knees and opened her mouth and my breeches, together, as if --"

Burr nearly stumbles arising from his chair in his hurry to reach his bedroom.

 

*

 

The gossip about the Pamphlet dies off, given a few months and a few new scandals. It's better this way, Burr thinks. He doesn't need to think about Hamilton very often -- certainly no more often than he thinks of him already.

Of course he meets Hamilton in the street; of course Hamilton falls into step alongside, though Burr rudely lengthens his stride to be rid of him. "I had hoped you might talk with me."

Five months since they last spoke. What can he want now? "On what concerns?"

"I recently published a -- a sort of pamphlet" -- and Hamilton has the grace to blush. "You might have heard of it."

In fact, Burr has begun to read select portions to himself at night, or to run over them in his mind, running his hands somewhere else. Not that it is _any_ of Hamilton's affair. "I am aware of it."

"I published it for political expedience, of course --"

Of course.

"-- but I find it somewhat backfired on me, and -- come on, Burr. Stop walking away. I need your help. Will you just _talk_ with me?" 

Burr stops walking, but he continues to look down the street, into the sun, shading his eyes. "Your ability to get yourself into a stupid mess because you don't _think_ beforehand will never fail to amaze me."

Hamilton tugs on Burr's sleeve until he lowers his arm and now they're standing face to face and Hamilton is grinning at him, saying "As if you've never been reckless? I remember a certain young soldier sneaking away to nighttime meetups with an enemy’s wife ..."

" _Reckless_ and _stupid_ aren't the same thing." Burr never risked more than he could afford to lose. But when have they ever understood each other? They're alike as two hands, Alexander's face as familiar as his own in the glass, and yet --

"Let me talk with you," says Hamilton again: and because he says _with_ _you_ and not _to you_ , because he looks determined and patient, because he hasn't yet let go of Burr's sleeve and it's almost awkwardly intimate in the street -- because the nights alone with the Pamphlet and his hand have begun to blur together into something more real than fantasy -- because this is what Burr wants -- he agrees to talk.

 

*

 

"What do you need?" Best to get it over with; best to be direct.

Hamilton shakes his head. "I only wanted to talk."

"About politics."

"What _isn't_ about politics, for us?" Hamilton smiles.

Burr doesn't return the expression. _Us_ , he'd said again. He feels something in his chest responding to that smile, and then a physical reaction as well; he makes a face and takes a seat to hide it. "The Pamphlet isn't helping Jefferson like you better, I'll admit -- though to be _entirely_ fair, Jefferson hates me too."

"I know that."

"Pleased with yourself, are you? He's entirely stripped my seat of the power it once had -- and if that hurts your prospects, you have no one to blame but yourself. You knew what he was like."

"Oh, shut up. I did the right thing. You'd be a terrible President."

"At least I would have the sense to abolish slavery, which --"

"Half the country would take up arms to _defend_ it, Burr! Do you really want to see another war?"

"We shouldn't flee from a fight in a just cause."

Hamilton says: "If you had a son, would you say that?" and his voice shakes, and --

And Burr looks away.

Hamilton runs his hands through his hair. It's greying now at the temple and at his ears; he looks, suddenly, old. "I did what I thought was best."

"I know." He did -- he does -- and he knew it at the time, despite his fury and betrayal. Hamilton is arrogant, argumentative, presumptuous, selfish, and entirely obsessed with his image, but he never never does what he thinks is wrong. He's consistent: Burr will give him that. Even if he is a damned liar half the time. "So. The Pamphlet. You ruined your own life, Alexander. What do you expect  _me_ to do about it?"

"I thought -- on a more personal level, I thought you might be able to help me."

 _More personal._ Burr's face grows hot, but it's impossible (almost impossible) that Hamilton knows what he's thinking, so he only says: "What do you mean?"

"I hoped you could talk to Betsy for me."

Burr laughs out loud, shaking his head in mixed amusement and relief. "Sure. She'll likely take that _very_ well. 'Madam, as your Vice-President, I exhort you to do your wifely duties and receive your husband back into your bed --' Is that about right?"

Alexander is bright red, now. "You don't have to be a pompous ass. I thought you could talk to her about -- I don't know. About Theodosia."

"My daughter?"

"Your late wife."

Burr never talks about her -- never -- and Hamilton knows that, and for him to bring it up -- to mention her memory as a bargaining chip -- it will not be borne. He stands to tell Hamilton to get the hell out of his house and out of his sight, and he's just settled on the right sentence when Hamilton rubs at his face, smearing a moisture across his pink cheeks, and -- and he's crying. He's _crying_. 

Fuck.

"Please don't," says Burr, because what else can he say, now? (He checks automatically: yes, the door is shut; they will not be disturbed.)

"Since Phil," says Hamilton, and then he chokes, he can't do on, and Burr does what he hasn't done to anyone nor accepted from anyone but his daughter in almost a decade: he takes him into his arms.

He lets him cry out there, not holding him tightly or intimately (except their mere position is intimate enough), stroking back his hair now and then and saying nonsense. He can't imagine what it would be to lose an adult child, and in such a way. Babies die all the time and it cracks your heart in pieces and then you have another to try and heal the wound, but babies are all possibility and no past; their loss is the loss of a dream. Philip was old enough to wander around town at night alone and court women; he was old enough to study law, no mind like his father's but quick enough.

Old enough to get into a goddamn duel over nothing. A Hamilton through and through. "Alex. I'm so sorry."

Hamilton chokes against his shoulder. "I shouldn't have done it."

\-- and that's the first admission of guilt or shame Burr has heard from this man in almost thirty years. (The last time was during the war. He’d had been crying that time, too. His tears always sound like they're dragged out of him with a hook. Burr'd forgotten that noise.)

Hamilton is not ashamed of crying (when is Alex ashamed of anything, _ever?_ ) but he's clearly at extremes, so – so Burr strokes his back, like he's soothing a child. "What did you do wrong?"

"I _told_ him to go. I gave him the guns. I told him, I told him, I _told_ him to do it --" He's repeating himself.

"Jesus Christ."

"Eliza found out, and she --"

 _"Jesus,"_ Burr says again, thinking how it took Philip three days to die, thinking again of the war -- how a gut wound made grown men scream for water, days of noise, days of a voice in the distance begging to be shot, Burr laying awake, knowing they couldn't afford to waste the ammunition, knowing mercy killings were worth a court-martial or a rope around their neck -- knowing his men did it anyway, when they could, if they could move fast enough to get there before the smoke cleared away from the battlefield. He hadn't ever commented when a soldier came back with a bloody uniform and bright eyes and no visible wounds. There hadn't been anything to say.

Now again he hasn't anything to say. "I'm so sorry," he tries, and that's not right, that's not good enough, it doesn't do anything against the weight of Hamilton, in his arms and grieving, so thoughtlessly he says " I can see why Betsy won't let you in her bed, after all this," and then they're both laughing -- Burr because he cannot believe he said that, and Hamilton because -- who knows.

"Burr," says Alex, shifting back.

Burr misses him. "What?"

Alex says: "I don't know what to do." And for once -- finally -- he sounds ashamed. His gaze drops away from meeting Burr's, and his mouth is starting to tremble again, and Burr has nothing to give him -- nothing -- except sympathy; he's been there too, when his wife died. He knows this extremity, this ledge with his fingers trembling and the ground falling away and his eyes closing, wanting to let go -- he know it -- he knows _Alexander_.

 _She prescribed such a tale of woe and misbegotten fate that my heart was captured_ Hamilton had written -- and Burr shouldn't be remembering that right now but he can't help it -- and when Hamilton looks up again with those damnably beautiful eyes, his mouth opening a little like he's trying to speak and failing, Burr can understand just why Alex risked so much for a stranger, how he was suddenly helpless against her weakness. He's helpless again now -- and so is Burr. There are tears on those beautiful lashes; a pink tongue comes out to lick that soft mouth -- _is_ it soft? Hamilton is usually so hard -- flinty, really -- time and grief and determination have thickened his shell, letting the real Alex retreat backwards, protect himself in words and words and words. He used to be clear, transparent, through and through. He used to be known; he was almost ready to be loved.

Burr can't bear this.

He leans forward just the little distance to close the gap between their bodies and Hamilton lets him lets him _lets him_ ...


	2. Chapter 2

Burr kisses that mouth until the grief falls away and Hamilton pushes at him, smiling a little. "Burr." His voice is unsteady.  "This is probably a poor time to remind you that I really do need help with Eliza."

Burr sits back and laughs until he has to wipe at his own eyes. "You're a shit."

"Why didn't we do this when we were kids?"

"Jesus fuck, I'm sorry for poor timing." He is, too; and he's angry with himself -- for doing it, for wanting him -- angry with Hamilton for responding, for saying Why didn't we do this years ago -- for being here -- for being alive. For everything they've done and haven't done in the last thirty years.

But Alexander grabs him by the arm again, like he did in the street, and just like before it slows down Burr's mind to individual points -- the pressure of his fingers, the warmth of their bodies close together. "It's okay. It's okay," he says, and laughs, not unkindly, and wipes at his eyes. "It's nice to know you'll try to make me feel better."

"Sure," says Burr. That's what it was. Sure. _Right_. And he jerks his arm away.

"Oh, for --" And Hamilton kisses him again, and holds him there until he's shivering. "Stop being so sensitive," he says, and lets go, and has the grace to look guilty this time. "I meant it," he says to the wallpaper. "You should have done that --"

"I didn't want you!" _Didn't_ , he'd said. Not _don't_.

"I wanted you." Another laugh. "Wasn't it obvious? I was always hounding you. Buying you drinks. Getting you alone. You were beautiful and I was lonesome and I wanted to be the first one to--"

"You've always been selfish," says Burr, automatically sparring. _Wasn't it obvious?_ No. No. Hamilton is joking. He must be joking. He's saying this to be kind. Or to change the mood, because he wept. Or to reassure Burr that he isn't so terribly awkward after all, that he didn't ruin this tentative peace between them with that reckless -- _stupid_ \--

"I'll talk to Eliza," he says, and Alex looks up -- he's sat on the rug and began to pick apart the knots. Burr sinks down to sit nearby, though he leaves the furnishings alone. "Though I don't know what you want me to say. If it's commiseration you want, I can't give it to you. I never, I never -- while my wife was living."

"Surely you hurt each other, sometimes. You're difficult as hell to communicate with across the supper table, Burr. I can only imagine how you'd be in bed."

Another twist of the knife, balanced on-point between flirtation and cruelty. "We had spats and rows. I was away too often. It's harder to understand each other when you don't talk." A beat. "Have you tried ... conversation?"

Hamilton shakes his head. "She won't listen to me."

"Well," says Burr, dry. "Go home and tell her that you kissed me. You'll gain her attention."

"I'll tell her you kissed first," says Hamilton, and he's smiling now.

"You wouldn't."

Hamilton groans. "You take everything so seriously."

"You don't take anything seriously enough!"

"I do." He clears his throat. "I didn't, before. But I do now."

"Since Philip."

"Before that. When General Washington passed," and -- it's unbelievable -- there's a roughness in Hamilton's voice; how can he still be so affected? "He said something to me before he passed. It was years ago, now. But it's stuck with me."

Burr waits: but Hamilton is not forthcoming and Burr will not press.

"And then, you know. The children. And Eliza's not getting any younger. And Philip. Yes. Seeing the country grow older, Burr. Do you remember what it was like, to watch it be born? And now we're on the outside of it."

Burr blinks -- he _is_ the Vice-President, after all -- but Hamilton is right and more than that he's still talking, growing expansive with his interest in the sound of his own voice, and he is so beautiful and he looks so young, so painfully young -- aren't they children still? Unflinching, they've grown used to the noise of guns around them. The screams of men and horses; Hamilton's dark eyes watching him in the darkness of a tent, canvas sides flapping wildly.

 _I wanted you,_ he'd said. _Wasn't it obvious?_

But he's always acted the same with me, thinks Burr, confused.

 _I need your help,_ he'd said. _Talk with me._ He's a mess, he looks pathetic, he's helpless, and it's impossible -- _impossible_ \-- isn't it? -- but he's reaching forward before he can help himself and taking up Alexander's hands, saying "Stop destroying my furnishings," and Alex is saying "You haven't even been listening," and Burr's hands are in his hair, his breath is hot in his face, and he's finally obedient to what Hamilton asked.

"I thought you'd _never_ ," says Hamilton, on a gasp: and then (astonishing) he is actually quiet -- for a while.

 

  
It is not after all a sudden burst of passion, culminating in torn clothes on the floor and sweaty, satiated bodies; they're adults now; they undress one another carefully, neither one remarks on any changes -- until Hamilton smiles outright, his eyebrow crooking in that old insolent amusement, staring at Burr's particular patch of hair. "Grey?"

"Ahem. Better grey than _red_."

"I'll have you know I get a lot of compliments on that color, Burr. It's very fashionable nowadays."

"I've never been modish," says Burr, barely able to speak through laughing, "but I'll be sure to ask Jefferson, he's always keen to what's popular --"

"You wouldn't dare, Aaron Burr."

"Maybe I'll publish a _book_ about it, Hamilton."

"Oh, shut up." Hamilton is blushing, he's really embarrassed -- so Burr pulls him closer and kisses him again, to comfort him, to reassure them both -- and then they are wordless together.

**Author's Note:**

> i am not exaggerating Hamilton's use of commas.
> 
> tumblr @littledeconstruction


End file.
